urgently wanted was "prompt and frank" action. Austria should not have
been allowed to rush upon Serbia, however just her causes for anger. On
the other hand the German Emperor should have at once and directly
appealed to the Czar to co-operate with him in endeavoring to secure
such a response to reason and expression of contrition on the part of
Serbia as would have eased off the situation, which was full of danger.
For, with an unfriendly Entente interesting itself, no war which broke
out was likely to be capable of being kept localized.

Tirpitz was not in Berlin on July 5, but he received reports from there
of what was happening. Neither he nor von Moltke, the Chief of the
General Staff, was consulted, but Tirpitz declares that the Emperor saw
at Potsdam the Minister of War, von Falkenhayn, and also the Minister of
the Military Cabinet, von Lyncker. If so, whether or not the conference
was technically a Crown Council, the meeting was a very important one.

Tirpitz confirms Bethmann in saying that, prompted by chivalrous
feeling, the German Emperor responded to the Emperor of Austria by
promising support and fidelity. He declares that the Emperor William did
not consider the intervention of Russia to protect Serbia as probable,
because he thought that the Czar would never support regicides, and
that, besides, Russia was not prepared for war, either in a military or
financial sense. Moreover, the Emperor somewhat optimistically presumed
that France would hold Russia back on account of her own disadvantageous
state of finance and her lack of heavy artillery. The Emperor did not
refer to England; complications with that country were not thought of.
The Emperor's view thus was that a further extension of dangerous
complications was unlikely. His hope was that Serbia would give in, but
he considered it desirable that Germany should be prepared in case of a
different issue of the Austro-Serbian dispute. It was for that reason